Devil's Arcade
by Chasing Liquor
Summary: McKay tries to embrace happiness, while confronted by both the despicable and his own limitations. McKeller.


**Disclaimer**: MGM owns all things "Atlantis." And italicized excerpts are courtesy of The Searchers, the Boss, and The Rolling Stones.

**Spoilers: **Nothing specific, but anything through "The Shrine."

**Description:** McKay tries to embrace happiness, while confronted by both the despicable and his own limitations. McKeller.

**Warnings: **A little graphic imagery; a couple vulgarities.

**A/N**: I got about halfway through the next chapter of "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner?" and just had to write another darker piece to break the rhythm. I'm not sure what that says about me.

This piece came about as I was screwing around on ITunes making thematic-blocked playlists. Even my musical enjoyment is being invaded by Atlantis/McKeller.

I hope that it came together all right, and I hope you enjoy it. Please do leave a review and let me know how it turned out.

* * *

**Devil's Arcade**

* * *

_I can see a new expression on my face_

_I can feel a glowing sensation taking place_

_I can hear guitars playing lovely tunes_

_Every time that you walk in the room_

* * *

Sheppard shrugged at Teyla, leaning back and crunching down on a chip.

"I'm not too worried about it."

She smiled, shaking her head.

"Well, that is your prerogative. But I do not think it will make a very good impression with Mr. Woolsey. This is your first department review under his leadership."

"Oh, please," McKay interjected. "We _own_ that guy. Woolsey's softer than Sam and Elizabeth put together."

Teyla could only shake her head again when Sheppard casually nodded his agreement.

"While Mr. Woolsey is a more reasonable man than his reputation indicated, it is my impression that he still values protocol quite highly."

"So do we," Sheppard replied innocently.

Teyla inclined her head indulgently, conceding defeat, and then sipped from her water bottle. She watched McKay stab at his dinner nervously. He didn't look upset, or stressed even, but simply restless.

He remained that way for the next few minutes, which passed silently, until Keller entered

It was kind of comical the way he acted like he didn't notice her arrival, eyes cast down at his tray, studying what was left of his meal. But it was the way those eyes had changed which outed him. They were brighter, and a little wider.

When he decided she was close enough to the table that he could finally look at her while retaining his self-respect, he glanced up as if only just spotting her, and smiled. She smiled in kind.

The ends of his mouth turned down a moment later, though, when he realized she was walking with a slight limp.

"Hey, Doc," Sheppard greeted.

"Hello," Teyla echoed.

Keller nodded pleasantly to both of them, then to McKay, muttering a soft greeting of her own.

He was still frowning, though.

"Did you hurt yourself?" he asked.

"Oh, I just bumped it on the desk on my way out. It's fine."

Most people would have accepted that explanation and let things be, but McKay leapt up as if she'd been shot, pulling out a chair for her.

"Here, here, here. Sit down!" he said, a little more forcefully than he wanted to. "I mean, uh, you shouldn't put weight on it."

"I have to get my food, Rodney," she replied, her smile softening a little.

"No, no, sit down. I'll get it for you. What would you like?"

"You don't have to – "

"Chicken, meatloaf?"

Sensing he'd not let the matter pass, she relented with a warm sigh.

"Chicken. Thanks."

"Sure, sure," McKay replied. "Sit down before you kill yourself."

She couldn't help a barely audible laugh as she complied. McKay dug up his most charming smile, but he was pretty sure he looked like an idiot as he walked much faster than was necessary to the serving area.

"Oh, brother," Sheppard mumbled.

* * *

_With her killer graces and her secret places_

_that no boy can fill_

_And with her hands on her hips, oh and that smile on her lips_

_because she knows that it kills me_

* * *

He could feel her eyes on him, and he hated it.

Not that he didn't love her eyes or the fact that she paid attention to him, but each glance she gave him made it harder to keep from saying the things he wanted to say.

It didn't help that they were sitting close enough that their legs were touching. It wasn't light contact either; they were solidly pressed against each other.

He was only half paying attention to the movie. Actually, he couldn't even recall the title. Something about New York yuppies working on their relationships. He despised the genre, if he was honest, but she seemed to like it, so it was fine by him.

She smiled at him, looking mildly concerned.

She might as well have straddled his lap and kissed him, because the look alone did him in.

"Jennifer…"

"Yes?"

He smoothed the lines out of his forehead.

"I should… probably say something to you."

She turned her body toward him, resting her chin in her hand and looking into his eyes with rapt attention and a radiance that threatened to end him where he sat.

Damn that woman, he thought. Damn her.

* * *

_I'm gonna tell ya how it's gonna be_

_You're gonna give your love to me_

_I'm gonna love you night and day_

_Well love is love and not fade away_

* * *

Monday, she asked him if he wanted to have dinner. He declined.

Tuesday, she asked if he wanted to have lunch. He declined.

Wednesday, she asked him to look at a scanner that wasn't actually broken. He obliged, but he was quiet, and he said that on

Thursday, he wouldn't have time to help her collect samples on M43-519 like he'd said he would. She wasn't happy to hear that.

Friday, she asked Sheppard if McKay was all right. He shrugged. It wasn't very helpful of him. She'd remember that during his next physical.

On Saturday, she couldn't even find him. It was as if he'd snapped his fingers and disappeared.

On Sunday, he was in the bowels of Atlantis working on getting some of the back-up generators online. She basically had him cornered. And she'd be lying if she said it wasn't sort of satisfying. The thrill of the proverbial hunt had worn off on Wednesday.

He was lying on his back underneath an open panel, orange and blue and red wires sticking out. It was nice every once in a while to not have to play Connect Four with a bunch of crystals.

When she called his name, he jerked up in surprise, smacking his head on the metal above him. She couldn't make out which expletive he used, but he uttered it with gusto.

As he twisted out from underneath the console, hand pressed to his head, eyes squeezed shut, and propped himself up on his other arm's elbow, she softly apologized.

When it looked like he didn't plan to stand up, she knelt down beside him.

"Let me see," she said, prying his hand away.

He didn't really mind. It was an excuse to let her touch him.

When she brushed her thumb over the point of contact, he flinched, and on impulse, she leaned down and kissed the spot. Even her lips on there hurt, but it was kind of like the hurt you feel when your neck's knotted up and someone digs in deep for you.

When she pulled back, she wasn't surprised to see the flummoxed look on his face.

"Better?" she asked.

"Um… sure?"

He felt so stupid that it came out as a question that he rolled over and pushed himself up off the floor, brushing off his shirt and turning to her with what he hoped was a neutral expression.

"So… what are you doing here?"

"Seems to be the only place you don't have an excuse not to see me."

"I'm sure I could still think of something."

She sighed. And he could tell she was mad. Usually she was mad on his behalf and it was kind of comforting, but she was definitely mad at _him_ right now.

"Rodney, I've had about a week of you playing Carmen Sandiego and I'm pretty tired of it."

He averted his eyes, thinking how dirty the floor was.

"You can't just say something like that to me and leave, and expect not to have to talk about it," she said.

He seemed to look contrite, but she suspected it was only about avoiding her, not about what he'd said to her to begin with.

"Listen, Jennifer… I – I'm sorry. You're right. That – I should have – you deserved – I just didn't want to…"

"Didn't want to what?"

He shook his head and looked away again.

"I didn't want you to talk me out of it."

Keller took a step toward him while he wasn't looking at her, and it was only when she spoke again that he turned his head back, and swallowed at her proximity.

"Rodney, what are you so scared for?" she asked, her voice almost softer than the hum of the machines.

He took in a labored breath, but expelled it quickly, and looked at her as if she were crazy not to get it.

"Look, Jen, I meant what I said. I don't want to start something I know I'm going to ruin. When I know all I'll do is hurt you. Horribly, I assume."

"But you don't know what will happen," she reasoned.

"That's just it. I don't _know _what will _happen_. And most of the time I think that, it turns out pretty damn bad," he said, running a hand through his hair, turning away from her. "I'm not gonna do that to you."

Keller watched him for a few seconds, noting his posture, the kind of frenzied energy waiting to burst out of him, while he willed his body just to stand there. And she knew then that all of this – this nonsense he was spewing – was all for her benefit, to protect her, and he was too hopelessly clueless to realize it was having the opposite effect.

She reached out and grabbed his arm, and her grasp alone was enough to turn him back. He flinched again at how close she was.

"Rodney."

"Hmm?"

"You're thinking too much."

When she was standing this near to him, and smelling of flowers or Irish Spring or maybe just natural Jennifer, his brilliant mind betrayed him.

"Really?" he murmured.

She nodded, smiling, and she could practically see his defiant will disintegrating.

"You're thinking this is one of those equations you do that takes up four whiteboards and has all kinds of crazy symbols, but it's not."

He gazed into her eyes, transfixed, pliable.

"But it's not," she repeated, leaning toward him. "It's a really easy one."

He licked his own lips, and he stared at hers, like he had a million other times. She was so close to him now. And in the corner of his mind where the Curious Scientist was hiding out, he noted with amazement how pleasant her breath smelled.

"You love me, and I love you. I want to kiss you, so I'm going to do it. And you don't really have a choice," she whispered, her hands drifting up over his shoulders, applying gentle pressure on the back of his neck, pulling his head down toward hers.

Their lips met an instant later, and all he could think as she softly pressed against him was that things weren't the same anymore, and that he wasn't alone, and that her hands on his head could erase the night.

* * *

_Can't see nothin' in front of me_

_Can't see nothin' coming up behind_

_I make my way through this darkness  
_

_I can't feel nothing but this chain that binds me_

* * *

They tore the hood off his head, the coarse fabric scratching his face painfully in the process.

He looked up into the cold eyes of the grimy locals. Their clothes looked tan, but he thought they might have been white at some point, before the guys rolled around in the dirt.

One of them had a face covered in scars, and the other obviously cut his own hair, because it was different lengths in different places, and his beard connected to one sideburn but not the other.

McKay looked between them, trying to breathe evenly. He thought they were the sort of guys who'd be satisfied if he couldn't.

"What's your name?" one of them asked, leaning on one knee, his leg propped up on a rock.

The scientist met his eyes for a second, then looked away, trying to think how Sheppard might respond.

"Jon Stewart," he said.

The other man, the one with all the scars, stood above their bound captive, staring down.

"And what do you do, Jon Stewart?"

"I make amusing remarks about the news," McKay answered.

Then he tasted some of his blood.

* * *

_Those first nervous evenings of perfume and gin_

_The lost smell on your breath as I helped you get it in_

_The rush of your lips, the feel of your name_

_The beat of your heart, the devil's arcade_

* * *

He looked down on her, shuddering, and she smiled up at him with dazed mirth.

His inclination was to close his eyes, to savor the feeling, but the insides of his lids were tattooed with terrible pictures, and his only hope was to keep looking at her – Jen, he thought, wiping his mind clean, his precious Jen – and she seemed to realize his need, because they reversed their places instants later, and she held him to her, so that he could feel her heart drumming in her chest: fast, too fast – but so, so, so alive.

* * *

_The sun sets in flames as the city burns  
_

_Another day gone down as the night turns  
_

_And I hold you here in my heart  
_

_as things fall apart_

* * *

The scientist grunted as the boot went into his ribs.

It was superfluous, the last shot. Both of them knew it wasn't necessary. The scarred man looked down on him with a lopsided smile, shaking his head in disgust.

McKay's eyes were blurred, but he could make out the unsymmetrical man in the background, chatting conspiratorially with a cluster of other bodies he couldn't separate from one another.

"They've got 'till tomorrow," the scarred man said. "If they don't meet our demands, I'll finally have the pleasure of ending things."

McKay coughed violently, turning onto his hip, one side of his face pressed into the dirt.

"They won't have to," he growled hoarsely. "They're going to – " He coughed again. " – come here… and kill you."

"You didn't have that kind of faith when you got here."

The scientist shook at the pain coursing through him, willing his body to still, lest his captors claim another victory.

"Yeah, well, I've…" He squeezed his eyes shut. "… had some… time to reflect."

He didn't hear his kidnapper say anything for a while after that, but he didn't feel his footsteps either. The man was just watching him, studying him, or perhaps simply reveling in the power he held just then.

"I know what you are," the scarred man said after a while.

McKay snorted sardonically.

"Oh yeah?" he mumbled, grunting again in pain. "What's that?"

"You're a coward at your core. The type who puts himself before others, and fears everything. But you hate yourself for it. So much that you act against all your urges."

The scarred man spit on the ground, sneering.

"When you want to weep," he said, "and beg me for your life, you do the opposite. You pretend to be defiant. You make jokes. But on the inside, you're still that coward. In your mind, you're screaming for someone to help you. No one's coming, though. You're alone."

McKay's thoughts drifted to the villagers, then to Sheppard, and then to Keller. The scarred man was right. In his brain, he was screaming for them to save him.

His mind's eye held a flickering image of the doctor, like a projector showing old home movies.

"Go to hell," he said. "That's what I'm thinking in my head."

* * *

_A place in the quiet, a home for the brave  
_

_the glorious kingdom of the sun on your face  
_

_Rising from a long night as dark as the grave  
_

_on a thin chain of next moments_

_and something like faith_

* * *

She didn't usually sleep this late. He was generally up before her, but it had been more than an hour now. Not that he was complaining. He wouldn't know what to say to her anyway.

Sunlight spilled in through a crack in the shades, warming one of her cheeks. She had a sort of glow to her wherever she went, but to see the sun shine on her was such a gift that his clumsy descriptions did it a disservice.

What was she doing here? Someone like her. Someone so gorgeous and precious and decent. It was beyond him what she saw in him that others didn't. Was she in love with some empty space that just _looked_ like it was full?

He rolled his head back, staring up at the ceiling where he lay.

There's this thing he was at his core, and he couldn't change it.

Not even when he saw Keller roll over, and not even when she greedily clutched at his body until she'd secured it with one arm, and not even moments later when her head fell on his chest.

Not even the second after that when he heard her sigh in utter contentment.

Not even when she seemed to wake and sleepily rub her face on his skin.

Not even when he kissed the top of her head and her arms tightly squeezed him.

Not even then.

* * *

_You said heroes are needed, so heroes get made  
_

_Somebody made a bet, somebody paid  
_

_The cool desert morning, then nothin' to save  
_

_Just metal and plastic where your body caved_

* * *

It was a bloodbath outside.

He could hear P-90 fire and screaming and a smattering of explosions beyond the cave's entrance.

"Get up!"

The unsymmetrical man pulled him up by the arm, drawing a pained exclamation from McKay, who staggered a few steps, struggling with his equilibrium with his hands bound behind him. He tried to turn his neck to glance at the kidnapper, but the muscles there were so tight that they began to spasm, and he abandoned the endeavor immediately.

"Damn it," the grimy man mumbled, frozen in indecision, McKay's confiscated Beretta held tightly at his side. "It's goin' to shit."

"That's because you're idiots," McKay mumbled tiredly.

It sounded profoundly weak an insult to his own ears, but it must have been good enough for the unsymmetrical man, because in his frustration, he pistol-whipped McKay in the back of the head, knocking him back to the ground.

The scientist groaned, writhing around in the dirt again, his dignity seeping out his head with some blood.

With a bitter, incensed, cacophonous howl, the unsymmetrical man wound his leg back and delivered a pernicious kick to McKay's head. Then he followed up with another to the ribs. And then another. And another and another and another and another.

McKay choked for a moment on some bile, then sucked in a wheezing breath, his body trembling. He fought for air like it were the last frontier, but he was caught alone in its unmapped desert, his lungs and raw throat seizing.

Pain rippled through him, his every nerve feeling compressed.

It was so hideous an experience, and so pervasive, that for just a few moments – moments shared by many throughout the millennia, both apes and modern man – McKay wished on himself the vapid bliss of death.

When the air finally filled his lungs, enough at least to sustain him, he caught a blurred image in his periphery of the unsymmetrical man stepping over him, either to enter the fray or to flee from it. And purely on instinct, in an act which escaped his mind's review, McKay lifted one of his legs to impede the man's path.

A moment later, there was a single gunshot.

The unsymmetrical man fell. Stretched out across the scientist.

McKay's eyes were only half-open, but he could make out the vague shapes of a head and a neck, and the latter was blotched red.

He listened to the macabre waltz outside. And he couldn't help thinking that he'd sung the song that brought it there.

If he'd just listened to the villagers, if he hadn't insisted they'd slow down his scans of the area, when really he was only afraid that they couldn't be trusted, then he'd never have been taken, and Sheppard and the villagers wouldn't have had to come for him, and he wouldn't be lying here 'neath the filthy corpse of a man who died in want of things.

He was already unconscious when an explosion sent some of the nearby scrap whirling, and covered the men with the lot of it.

* * *

_You know that flag flyin' over the courthouse  
_

_means certain things are set in stone  
_

_Who we are, what we'll do, and what we won't_

* * *

He'd been working later and later, and waking up earlier and earlier. At first, she accepted his explanations about "important projects." But as time wore on, he grew more distant and his excuses got lazier.

It wasn't _so_ long ago that she'd spent all her nights alone, but to sleep in a half-empty bed seemed an abhorrent thing now.

The worst part was that it was mostly her fault.

She'd wanted so badly to believe that the wounds underneath his skin had healed the same as the ones above it, that she'd skimmed over all the evidence to the contrary. The wounds had festered, spread, like gangrene of the spirit. She was losing him, she knew.

The walk to his lab was half over by the time she realized she was barefoot. But if the people she passed by thought anything of it, or of her sweatpants or t-shirt, they didn't betray it. Maybe they just saw the look on her face and didn't want the trouble.

It wasn't exactly surprising that he was only the one there, considering it was one o'clock in the morning.

He was surrounded by coffee cups. Some of them were only half-empty, as if he'd left them sitting too long to be drinkable. That wasn't normal for him; he was generally quite attentive to his caffeinated beverages. It seemed even his workaholic tendencies were skewed.

Hunched over his laptop, he pounded away at the keys as if aggrieved by them. His blue eyes were dim, rimmed with black smudges, and his hair was disheveled like Sheppard's. He wasn't the same man he'd been when he stepped onto that planet three months ago.

She padded across the floor softly, and to her mild surprise, he heard and saw her coming, looking up from his work.

It broke her heart when he tried to fake a smile.

"Hey," he murmured hoarsely.

Keller smiled too, but sadly.

"It's late, Rodney," she said, perching herself on the edge of his desk as she had dozens of times before. "Why don't you come to bed?"

He shook his head, waving his hand dismissively.

"No, I've some things to do."

"You say that every night."

"Then you'd _think_ it would be clear how busy I am!" he snapped.

Keller blinked, the angry exclamation rolling off of her. She wouldn't have thought much of the remark on a normal day, and she thought even less of it now.

"And yet here I am not believing it," she replied dryly.

McKay scowled, but said nothing, returning to his work as if she wasn't even there. She let him continue for a minute, maybe even two or three, before she spoke again, her voice softer this time, but firm in its tacit demand.

"Rodney, I know you don't want to talk about it. But this isn't good."

"What isn't?"

She fought hard not to roll her eyes.

"You staying here until three in the morning, sleeping two hours, and getting right back to work. Drinking God knows how much coffee every day."

She paused, looking down for a moment, as if to gather herself, before she gazed into his dull blue optics again.

"Carrying around whatever it is you're carrying."

"I told you before," he replied curtly, "that I don't want to talk about it."

"Too bad."

"Just leave me alone and let me – "

"No. You're going to _deal_ with this."

McKay's eyes flashed with anger.

"_Damn it_, Jen!" he barked. "Leave it alone! Just _leave it_! What the hell do you _want_ from me? You want me to write a memoir for you? You wanna role-play Captor and Captive, so I can 'come to terms' with my anger? What is it you want me to do?!"

The angrier he got, the calmer she did. His tirade elicited nothing from her but compassion. And he hated her for it. He hated her for wanting to fix this.

Keller didn't dare touch him. He might burn before her eyes. But she was close to him, close enough that she could almost inhale his anger, like a kind of secondhand smoke.

"I want you to talk to me," she said quietly. "That's all I want. I promise I won't say anything if you don't want me to. I'll sit here and I won't open my mouth. But please tell me."

McKay looked away, seeming at first to consider the matter for a period of about a minute, and then seeming to decide against it, his angry expression shed, replaced by a stoic one.

She thought all might be lost. That the things she said didn't mean anything to him. That her presence there was a cosmic fact, but impertinent to his fate.

He didn't look back at her, and his expression didn't much change, but he did finally speak.

"I tried to do what Sheppard would do," he said, and she could see that one of his hands was shaking. "But… but I..." He swallowed. "I ended up doing something he wouldn't."

Her heart sank.

"Rodney, no one blames you."

He shook his head, his voice utterly placid, though the hand visible to her was still trembling.

"Not out loud, they don't. But I know they do on the inside."

"_No_," she said firmly. "_No one_ thinks it. Okay? No one."

McKay smiled a smile of despair, struck with affection for what he perceived was her naivety. He looked off into the distance, past the walls of Atlantis and the walls of men and the walls God built to keep them all apart.

"There's things that happen that tell you what you are," he said. "And once people know, there's no going back."

* * *

_The beat of your heart, the beat of your heart  
_

_The beat of your heart, the beat of her heart  
_

_The beat of her heart, the slow burning away  
_

_of the bitter fires of the devil's arcade_

* * *

Keller waited impatiently as Ronon and Teyla and Lorne cleared off the debris.

As soon as they finished, she demanded a gurney.

McKay was a mess, covered in lacerations and putrid welts. There was no mistaking the hideous things which had been done to him.

His t-shirt was ragged, torn in enough places that it was more shredded than whole, and the missing pieces let be seen large, clumsily-bandaged wounds that looked to have had salt poured into them.

All told, he had a dislocated shoulder, a displaced patella, a concussion, fractures of two ribs, and seven individual wounds that would need to be sewed shut.

It was only after McKay was treated in Atlantis and sleeping soundly in an infirmary bed, that Sheppard, who had been shifty-eyed throughout the day, finally pulled Keller aside, away from the prying eyes and ears of the nurses and the wounded.

"What is it?" she asked.

Sheppard pulled a creased piece of crudely-fashioned paper from his pocket. Slowly unfolding it, he handed it to the doctor, his eyes barely able to meet hers.

As she read it, he said softly, "It's a confession."

* * *

_It's gonna be a long walk home_

_Hey pretty Darling, don't wait up for me_

_Gonna be a long walk home_

_It's gonna be a long walk home_

* * *

McKay looked up at her sadly, his eyes intensely imploring.

"You believe me, don't you?" he asked, just barely audible. "That it wasn't right away. I _swear_ it wasn't right away."

Keller shook her head emphatically, brows knit.

"Rodney, it doesn't matter when – "

"Do you** believe** me?" he demanded.

Keller flinched, taken aback by his insistence. What difference did it make? The distinction was clearly important to him, though. So she nodded.

It was good enough for McKay, who looked away, calmer.

"It was the last day. If I'd known, maybe – I might have…"

She still wasn't sure if she should touch him, but she couldn't help it now. She reached out and grabbed his hand firmly. That brought his eyes back to hers. Those haunted eyes.

"Listen to me, Rodney," she said, her voice steady and resolved. "It's not your fault that you were _tortured_! Okay? You didn't choose to have that happen to you. And it's not your fault that you told them what they wanted to hear to make them stop."

McKay tried to pull his hand away from her, but she wouldn't let him.

"It's not your fault," she repeated.

Since he couldn't pull away, he just averted his eyes.

"Sheppard wouldn't have done it."

"Sheppard is a _career soldier_," Keller replied incredulously, "who's trained to withstand that. And who knows if he could have anyway. You're a _scientist_. It's amazing that you held out for as long as you did. I wouldn't have."

He didn't say anything to that, and he didn't move. She wasn't sure what that meant. But finally satisfied that he wasn't going to pull away, she loosened her grip on the hand she held, stroking the back of it with her thumb.

McKay let out a self-deprecating grunt.

"What are you doing?" he asked.

She blinked.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, why are you here, putting up with me, when I've just about lost my mind?"

Keller thought for a moment. Then she smiled softly and reached out with her free hand to touch his face, and turn it toward her. He let it happen, and looked in her eyes again. Losing himself to something different than pain.

"I'm here because when you saw me limping, you wouldn't let me walk another ten feet to pick up dinner," she said.

For the first time in a long time, he smiled. It wasn't but the slightest twitch of the lips, but it meant more to her than he'd ever know.

He sighed.

"Are you sure I can't convince you to run while you still can?"

Keller shook her head, then reached out to cradle his, drawing it to her stomach and holding it there. He happily let her, wrapping his arms around her waist.

"Sorry," she said, and he could hear the grin in her voice. "Like I told you before, you don't have a choice."

* * *

_I believe in the love that you gave me  
_

_I believe in the faith that could save me  
_

_I believe in the hope, and I pray that some day_

_it may raise me above these Badlands_

* * *

**FIN**

* * *


End file.
